On January 24, 2025, FERC reinstated a certificate of public convenience and necessity (“CPCN”) for Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Company’s (“Transco”) Regional Energy Access Expansion Project (“Project”) after the D.C. Circuit vacated and remanded FERC’s initial order certificating the Project (“Certificate Order”).

In January 2023, FERC granted Transco a CPCN

On January 14, 2025, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit (“D.C. Circuit”) held that FERC complied with the National Environmental Policy Act (“NEPA”) in approving the surrender of a hydroelectric project license. The court found that FERC had adequately considered the alternative of dam removal and determined that keeping the dams in place outweighed any potential benefits to recreation, fisheries, and other environmental concerns. The case, American Whitewater v. FERC, involved a challenge to FERC’s license surrender decision regarding the Somersworth Hydroelectric Project (“Project”) on the Salmon Falls River, which spans the border between New Hampshire and Maine.

On December 16, 2024, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (“FERC”) directed American Efficient, LLC, its subsidiaries, and corporate parents (collectively, “American Efficient”) to show cause why American Efficient should not be found to have violated anti-manipulation rules. The order alleges that American Efficient engaged in a manipulative scheme to extract millions of dollars in capacity payments from Midcontinent Independent System Operator, Inc. (“MISO”) and PJM Interconnection, L.L.C. (“PJM”) for energy efficiency projects that did not actually reduce energy use. FERC also requested American Efficient to show cause why they should not disgorge over $253 million in unjust profits and pay a civil penalty of $722 million.

On November 21, 2024, FERC issued Order No. 1920-A, which modified Order No. 1920 to expand the states’ roles in long-term transmission planning and clarified requirements for such planning as set forth in Order No. 1920. FERC made changes in three broad areas, amongst many other modifications: (1) expanding the role of state entities in the transmission planning process, (2) requiring transmission providers to create additional transmission planning scenarios to inform implementation of cost allocation methods upon the request of state entities, and (3) removing the requirement for transmission providers to include corporate financial commitments in Factor Category Seven when developing long-term transmission planning scenarios.

On December 5, 2024, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit heard oral arguments in Transource Pennsylvania LLC v. Steven M. Defrank, et.al. The case presents the question of potential tension between FERC’s exclusive authority over transmission planning and a state’s siting authority. The court has not yet decided the case.

On September 12, 2024, FERC’s Chief Accountant issued a notice of proposed accounting release (“NOPAR”) to modify the transferability of income tax credits (“ITCs”) related to certain energy projects under the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 (“IRA”), which allows entities to monetize such ITCs via transfers to independent third parties

On September 10 and 11, 2024, FERC staff held a two-day workshop at its headquarters in Washington, DC on opportunities to further refine the generator interconnection queue process. Panelists and FERC staff discussed potential enhancements to transmission planning and processing interconnection requests over the course of six panels on discrete

David Rosner and Lindsay See have been sworn in as FERC’s newest Commissioners on June 13 and 28, 2024, respectively. The FERC Open Meeting on June 27 marked Commissioner Rosner’s first Open Meeting and Commissioner Allison Clements’ last Open Meeting before her term expired on June 30, 2024. The U.S. Senate previously confirmed now-current Commissioners Rosner and See on June 13, 2024, along with Judy Chang. It is likely that Judy Chang will be sworn in as Commissioner in the coming days. Judy Chang’s swearing in will bring the agency to its full complement of five commissioners.  

On May 23, 2024, FERC issued an Order denying Lackawanna Energy Center LLC’s (“Lackawanna”) complaint against PJM Interconnection, L.L.C. (“PJM”) alleging that PJM failed to reimburse Lackawanna for lost opportunity costs (“LOC”) incurred following allegedly improper curtailment orders from PJM during a 2023 transmission line outage.  Lackawanna argued that PJM’s curtailment of its generation output violated the Federal Power Act and the PJM Tariff, which typically allow for LOC payments when generator output is reduced due to transmission constraints or reliability issues.  FERC dismissed all claims raised in the complaint.

On March 28, 2024, the Midcontinent Independent System Operator, Inc. (“MISO”) submitted a filing to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (“FERC”) proposing revisions to its Open Access Transmission, Energy and Operating Reserve Markets Tariff (“Tariff”) to implement a direct loss of load (“DLOL”) based accreditation methodology.  The DLOL methodology will be used to accredit resources for MISO’s annual Planning Resource Auction and to determine a load serving entity’s resource adequacy for each season during the applicable year.  According to MISO, the proposal will better account for how different resources bolster grid reliability during stress periods.  MISO requests that the tariff revisions take effect on September 1, 2024.